T h e burn by the march (from a drawing by Sidney Steel) . . . . . . .
T h e iitt le mischief-maker
A roebuck barking . . . . . • • • • • • •
Th e figure 8 ring, Cawdor •
Pied variety, Foyers, Inverness, N .B . (author’s collection) . . . ■ • •
Usual attitude to escape by hiding . - • ■ • • • •
Going through a wire fence . • • • - • • •
Roebucks, Murthly, Perthshire (from a photograph by Geoffrey Millais) . . . .
A poacher’s trick for capturing roe by means o f set hooks (from a drawing by Sidney Steel)
Melanie variety (German), now in the collection o f the Hon. Walter Rothschild . . . .
R O E - S T A L K IN G A N D R O E H E A D S
E L E C T R O -E T C H IN G
T h e last drive, Rohallion . . . . • • ■ To face page
IN T H E T E X T
A wonderful German head, shot 12th January 1588, near Marburg in Hessen, now in the Museum at Cassel
Coming down the pass (from a drawing by Sidney Steel) . . . . . . .
Shape o f horn-growth due to environment (author’s collection) . - ^------ ■
Roebuck finishing the fraying o f his horns with his hind foot . . . . . . .
A good head, Altyre .
Head o f a very old roebuck, the horns having declined (from a drawing by Sidney Steel) . . . .
Heads with an unusual number o f points
Three best heads, Sir Henry Gore Booth’s collection, Lissadell, Sligo, Ireland . . . . .
T w o back views o f the 12-point Lissadell head
Cast horn, roebuck, Lissadell, Sligo, Ireland . . . . . . . . .
Mossed head, Brahan Castle collection . . . . . . • •
Head o f a roebuck with remarkably long horns, shot by R. Moncrieff at Foulis-Wester, Perthshire
T h e best heads in the collection o f the late C. Macpherson Grant, and now at Drumduan, Forres (from a
drawing by Sidney Steel)
Killed at Ortori, Speyside (in the possession o f Sir G . Macpherson Grant, Bart.). . . . .
A remarkable dropped antler with unusual number o f points (in the possession ofSir G . Macpherson Grant, Bart.)
Head o f roe shot by Colonel Gordon-Cumming at Auchintoul, Aberdeen . . . •
Curious horn, Dupplin Castle, collection o f the Earl o f K innoull . . . . . .
Three best normal heads (author’s collection) .
A three-horned and a four-horned roebuck (author’s collection and British Museum) . . . .
12-pointer in the possession o f Mr. H. M. Warrand . . . . . . . .
Roe with extra coronet on the left horn . . . . . . . . . .
So-called perruque heads, Scotland ; collection o f the late C. Macpherson Grant, and British Museum
Female roe with horns . . . . . . . . • •
Some remarkable abnormal German heads . . . . • • • • •
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British Deer and their Horns
CH A P T E R I
E X T I N C T B R I T I S H D E E R
E v e n in these education-made-easy days Palaeontology is hardly a word to conjure with.
It is too much o f a mouthful for most people, and in point o f sound it has not even the
charm that a pious old lady is said to have found in “ that blessed word Mesopotamia.”
Then as to the science itself, some o f us may perhaps think we had enough o f it in early
youth when periodically dragged by a tutor through the dingy recesses o f the old British
Museum in Russell Street, and then and there crammed with more learning than we could
digest about the marvellous creatures o f the Pliocene and Pleistocene ages. Be that as it may,
I must touch upon the subject in these pages, though only— as I hasten to assure the timid
reader— in the most cursory and perfunctory fashion. Indeed it would be an impertinence
on my part to attempt anything more than this, since the whole subject has been exhaustively
dealt with by some o f our more eminent scientists, notably Professor Owen and Professor
Boyd Dawkins.
And now I must mention the various species o f deer which have been named from the
fossil remains o f their bones and horns, and denoting at the same time the localities in which
they were discovered. T hey are, Pliocene : (1) extinct British elk {Alces latifrons), loc. Norfolk
and Suffolk forest beds; (2) Dawkins’s deer (Cervus Daw kins i), loc. Norfolk and Suffolk
forest beds ; (3) Savin’s deer (Cervus Savini), loc. Norfolk forest bed; (4) Cervus verticornis,
loc. forest bed, Lowestoft; (5) Cervus polignacus, loc. forest bed, Mundesly, Norfolk ; (6)
Sedgwick’s deer (Cervus Sedgwickii), loc. forest bed, Bacton, Norfolk; (7) Buckland’s fossil
deer (Cervus Bucklandi), loc. Kirkdale; (8) Brown’s deer (Cervus Browni), loc. Clacton,
Essex; and Pleistocene : (9) gigantic round-antlered deer (Strongyloceros spelaeus) and red deer
{Cervus elaphus), lpcl England, Scotland, and Ireland; (10) gigantic Irish deer {Megaceros
hibernicus), loc. England, Scotland, and Ireland; (11) reindeer (Tarandus rangifer), loc.
England, Scotland, and Ireland ; and roe (Capreolus caprea).
Some idea o f the forms which the horns o f these deer presented may be gathered from
the accompanying illustrations and measurements, to which only a few words need be added.
E x t i n c t B r i t i s h E l k {Alces latifrons).— This deer, which closely resembles the elk still
found in Europe, is said by Professor Boyd Dawkins to have inhabited Norfolk and the great
valley between that county and Norway which was eventually covered by the glacial sea.